Much attention has been given in recent years to systems used in retail stores for displaying prices of goods. While manual marking of the prices at the location of the goods, or on the goods themselves, is conventional, attempts have been made to use electronic means, instead, for displaying the prices at the goods location.
Some electronic pricing systems have been proposed to employ electronic labels or modules, each typically having a liquid crystal display, for displaying the prices. Buses for power and data are used in such systems to connect many thousands of such labels to a central computer for the latter to communicate with particular ones of the labels to, for example, request changes in their displayed prices. To this end, the labels are equipped with connectors so that they can be snapped onto one of many locations along rails which include the buses, and which run along the edges of store shelves. The connectors also provide the labels with electrical connections to the central computer through the buses.
In order to provide customers with helpful information such as brand names of the goods other than their prices, it is desirable to have an electronic label capable of displaying a string of characters, which may be too long to cover in one display screen and need to be divided into several screens. It is also desirable to have a broad selection of characters for display to achieve an effective conveyance of the information. It is undesirable however that while the string of characters for display is being updated, the label displays incomprehensible information. Accordingly, in order to coordinate the display function of individual labels well, it is important for the central computer to communicate effectively to them.